


The Auroral light

by Ruta



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst and Feels, F/M, Introspection, Married Couple, Miscarriage, Post-War, Sad with a Happy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-12
Updated: 2016-08-12
Packaged: 2018-08-08 06:28:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7746670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruta/pseuds/Ruta
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The real madness, and only the memory makes him tremble, is close his eyes and see again the dawn sets on fire her hair and the hope that it was all over, over, over. The war won, the enemies driven back into their prisons of ice and oblivion.<br/>When the blood had begun to stain her skirts and he had failed to wake her, despite shouted and shook her hard, he had known the true madness and the real fear.<br/>Never again, he had vowed then. Never again.<br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	The Auroral light

_Morning is due to all,_ Emily Dickinson

“Morning is due to all — To some — the Night — To an imperial few — The Auroral light.”

 

* * *

 

_It should not have happened._

It is what Jon says in anguish when Sam tells him the news as Maester of House Stark.

_It was not expected to happen._

It is what he says with an internal shudder to Brienne, the woman - warrior who is Sansa’s faithful shadow, the guardian who watches over her as Lady once did, in a different, crystallized time when all seemed pretty darn complicated and instead was easy like love given and received in return.

Brienne, unlike Sam who has graced him with a silence burdened with unspoken reproach and the noise of his chain’s link, does not show the same leniency. Her gaze is sharp as the edge of the sword hanging at her side day and night. Her words are cutting as those of a caustic lion which, someone tattles, she has devoted herself, woman’s heart and knight’s soul. No matter what feats she performs or what amazing venture brings to fulfillment, new names do not delete the old ones. The spots do not go away and her youth is burned, trampled and forgotten. This woman, who has more courage and fortitude than any man he had ever met, now looks at him with obvious disgust. She has every reason. He too is repelled by himself.

“It was not expected to happen." The words he spoke were the last bastion to defend himself from the man who he would have never thought of becoming. A man without honor. Those words, repeated ironically by Brienne, have the bitter taste of defeat. "And tell me, your grace, which consequences did you think would have had your behavior?"

Jon bows his head contritely. "I acted recklessly, but-"

"Riding a horse in a tempest is act recklessly!" Her nostrils quiver, seized by blind fury and rage. "Throw yourself into battle with a blunt weapon is act recklessly! What you have done, Your Grace, was not reckless. It was much worse. It was an act of pure selfishness."

Yes, it was. Having Sansa when he knew he should not have her ever again was an act of selfishness, although he called it love. "I can fix that."

"How?" The distress in her voice is an open window on a precipice.

"I can convince her. I can do it."

"You will fail."

And his sentence is there, enclosed in that 'you will fail'. Because it is true. Sansa’s state is a sufficient proof of his failure as a husband. He vowed to protect her before the old gods, the graves of his ancestors. He swore it to the man who has called father for half his life, to the boys who has called brothers, to the faceless woman who once was his sister and was Arya one last time before vanishing in the bloody dawn after the last battle.

He will convince her. Even if he were to force her. Even if he were to be hated by her for this, he will not fail. Not any more than he has already done.

"I hope you know what you do."

Again, it hovers between them the implicit threat of defeat that she has already pessimistically predicted.

"I'm aware."

He would lose her and this, after facing his worst fears, is the only one that he is sure he could never overcome.

 

* * *

 

 

Observing the radiant profile of his wife and the sweetness that softens her face in an expression of contemplative adoration, Jon wonders how he could not figure out the warning signs before. Sudden cravings, the slight rounding of the forms that the war and the winter had sucked into a vortex of malnutrition and apathy.

The truth is that Sansa has never seemed more charming. How he cannot love her? Her seductive loveliness, her graceful movements, her way of speaking, her way of walking. When in the morning, untangling herself from the blankets and from his arms, she sings songs that were taught to her as a child and bustles around the room. The fact that the practical side and the steady hand required for the management of the castle have prevailed on the dreamer that she was in the past, before discovering that every person has two sides, a better and a worse, a pleasant one and one that is a bit less.

He thought he had lost her in the Long Night, in the blood that stained the predominant colors of the black of night, and the white of the enemies, bone and snow. He had been afraid that he would never hear again her sweet voice, that the last human sound that he would listen before giving up to the dark and the cold were the screams that tore apart the silence, ripping one by one the layers to the madness as those of an onion. He had been afraid that he would have gone crazy for sleep deprivation, for the sacrilege of death, for the horror of what he had seen and had been forced to do to survive.

And he has gone crazy, yes, but of a different madness. A frenzy that has corroded his flesh like wildfire. The real madness, and only the memory makes him tremble, is close his eyes and see again the auroral light sets on fire her hair and the hope that it was all over, over, over. The war won, the enemies driven back into their prisons of ice and oblivion. Taste that ravenous kiss, voracious of life and warmth and the precious wonders that Sansa preserved always, that she promised with her grace. Sense her hands in his hair and then ripping back to reality as she had become a dead weight in his arms, pale and gray and cold, too cold. And when the blood had begun to stain her skirts and he had failed to wake her, despite shouted and shook her hard, he had known the true madness and the real fear.

Never again, he had vowed then. Never again.

The night is lonely and still. The dawn brings quietness and peace. Sansa is his peace.

Sansa turns. Her figure proudly displays in the window frame, surrounded by the clear light of morning. She has her hands clasped in her lap that she has stopped to hide in clothes tailored.

Sam prefers to wait for nature to take its course before making judgments. He cannot push Sansa to do something that is obvious she does not want to do. Instead Brienne is like him, devoured by the atavistic terror of losing her lady, the only reason that gives meaning to her days.

Why she has not informed him earlier? He already knows what she would reply, as she would shake her head, the smile she would direct at him.  _Would have you shared my pleasure, my happiness?_

No, probably not. The thought of risking her for the ghost laughter of a child, the empty echo of light footsteps, Sansa’s eyes in Arya child 's face would have unseated any trepidation. But Sansa’s joy now that the truth is leaked, that the second life growing inside her is visible, palpable as the scent of jasmine wafting around her, has an inexplicable effect on him.

The first time was bad luck, because of physical exhaustion and tension, but Sam had also said that the episode had damaged her intimately. He had advised him to avoid further attempts. There had been doubts, never expressed verbally, that their blood kinship were partly to blame. Marriages between cousins weakened blood, in the long run generated monsters and aberrations.

Sansa’s right hand is still on her belly, but she has tended the other toward him.

Jon takes his wife's hand and brings it to his lips. He saw her smile and is the first nice thing that he remembers seeing, as beautiful as Arya’s fierce air when as a child had told him that she did not care what others said, to her he was her brother.

He is not the man that he would and should be. He is not strong enough or courageous or honorable. Sansa is all these things and much more.

When she pushes his hand down and rests it on the round and pronounced curve of her abdomen, Jon leaps and perceives a similar wriggle under his fingers.

"This is your son." Sansa looks at him with pride, and there is the auroral light in her eyes and in her face, the dawn of that terrible day on the Wall.

Jon knows he is a coward and that he will not keep the promise he made to himself. Brienne was right and she is more far-sighted and wise of him. The failure was assured and he has just laid down his arms.


End file.
